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[URBAN] Parametric_Ism

URBAN PROPOSAL THROUGH SYSTEMATIC MORPHOLOGIES

DESIGN RESEARCH

The aim of this project is to examine and apply parametric design systems at different architectural scales. The strength of these systems comes from their ability to produce numerous variations of a single design input, whilst maintaining a coherent generative progression of the output elements. The overall site was considered as a substrate in which a dynamic fluid simulator derived conditions of urban constituents in relation to particular variables like the number and density of urban districts, site boundaries and interactions with existing infra-structure systems.

The same methodology was utilized in each of the district components. Districts were broken down into their respective towers which were further branched into subsystems of floors, cores, voids and skins. Each system is transformable and adaptable to integrate specific requirements such as areas, usage, function and level of privacy.

This project emphasizes the level of integration between systems and sub-systems of the urban fabric and illustrates how they can be independently altered while maintaining coherent and consistent relationships of flow between each other.

This design research examines parametric design concepts at different architectural scales and shows how different systems can be altered independently while maintaining the coherence and the consistency of the overall composition. Various tools were used to drive the parametric configuration of the overall urban field to match certain programmatic requirements such as density, scale and level of privacy of each urban component.

The process went from a digital manipulation to a physical production of overall massing of the master plan and details of the subcomponents. This aided in designing each individual component in response to the zones, shadow, light effects and the overall flow of the urban field.

SYSTEMATIC MORPHOLOGIES

DESIGN RESEARCH

This research focuses on analyzing and mapping some transformable substances through an external deforming force, in this case heat. Any change in the parameters of a self-determining variable, systematically affects the nature of the resulting surface. The interchange between the variables results in generated forms that are analyzed and adapted to accommodate intensity of light penetration, shadows, scale and level of enclosure of the architectural spaces. Rigorous computational processes drive the design. Physical modeling was incorporated into the design process to asses, transform and modulate the form and the adaptive skin.

Changes in the parameters of a self-determining variable systematically affect the nature of the resulting surface. Plaster models were produced to asses, transform and modulate the form.

Al Hudaiba Earthbound Construction Plant

Representing Dubai in Seoul Biennale 2017

In 1969, by landing on the moon the United States has effectively “won” the space race that had begun with Soviet Sputnik’s launch in 1957. Ever since the historic moment, there was no other attempt of sending a man to another planet in the solar system. Now after decades of space technology development coupled with the increasingly imminent threat of global warming, humans have started looking into the outer space again, and this time they want to leave earth permanently. The UAE is one of the first nation to quickly expressed interest in establishing a human settlement on Mars, apart from the USA. Deemed to be called as ‘City of Happiness’ the country is setting up to build a Chicago-sized city on the red planet by 2117, giving themselves 100 years timeframe. Sending its first scout satellite by 2020, this leaves the UAE just 80 years to have the city up and running. It would cost a minimum of 200,000 USD per one-way ticket for a person to go to Mars, surely the colonists will not come from the middle-income class, let alone the lower-income population who are usually the backbone of the construction of a city. So who will build the entire city and how? Intelligent machine is reliable in building small scale shelter however could be extremely costly and unreliable towards immensely large scale construction. With UAE’s history of employing large population of immigrant labour workers to build their luxurious skyscrapers, it has the experience and advantage of building highly ambitious projects efficiently. Hudaiba being a locality populated by low income labour workers, its serves as an attractive site of locating an earthbound Mars construction plant to facilitate the production of construction components to be transported to Mars for faster and cost-efficient assembly. The plant facility will serve as a new urban quarters for Hudaiba residents in return of serving to build urban quarters for the elite colonists on Mars. It will be built on modular system so that it can expand in response towards Mars colonization construction demands.